[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 34, Number 42 (Monday, October 19, 1998)]
[Pages 2059-2060]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on the Budget Agreement and an Exchange With Reporters

October 15, 1998.

    The President. Thank you very much. First of all, I would like to 
echo much of what has been said. I want to thank the members of our 
negotiating team. Erskine Bowles' swan song turned out to be quite a 
show, and I thank him for everything he's done, for me and for our 
country, but especially for these last 8 days. I thank John Podesta and 
Maria Echaveste, Jack Lew, Sylvia Matthews, the entire economic team 
that are back here.
    I also want to make it clear that none of this could have been done, 
in my view, not a bit of it, if we hadn't had a strong, united front 
from the members of our party in both Houses, led by Tom Daschle and 
Dick Gephardt, who believe passionately in what we were fighting for for 
the American people.
    And finally, let me say I would like to thank the leaders of the 
Republican Party who made these agreements with us. And I ask you, as I 
make my remarks about what I think was most important about them, just 
think--we didn't even start this work until after the whole budget year 
was over. Just think what we could do for America if we had these 
priorities all year long instead of just for 8 days. And I just can't 
tell you how grateful I am for these achievements.
    Let me give you my perspective. First of all, in terms of the 
priorities I set forth in the State of the Union Address last January, 
we did save the surplus for the hard work of Social Security reform 
early next year. Secondly, we made major strides in renewing our public 
schools, especially with the truly historic commitment of 100,000 new 
teachers to reduce class size in the early grades. And thirdly, we made 
a profound commitment to strengthening our own economy here by assuming 
our responsibility to stabilize the global economy on which so much of 
our prosperity depends. Now without the perseverance of the people 
behind me and those whom they represent, none of that could have 
happened.
    Let's look at the education issues. One hundred thousand new 
teachers will enable us to reduce class size in the early grades to an 
average of 18. Over here at this school violence conference that we 
sponsored all day, one of the things they kept hammering home, all these 
educators, was we can find the troubled children; we can prevent a lot 
of these problems if we can have them in small enough classes in the 
early grades.
    We achieved full funding for other important educational 
initiatives, from child literacy to college mentoring, from after-school 
programs to summer jobs. We did meet our obligations to the 
International Monetary Fund. And we honored our obligations to the next 
generation by strongly protecting the environment, and I'd just like to 
mention three things: One, we got rid of the most objectionable 
environmental riders; two, we had a full funding of our clean water 
initiative, which is very important--remember, 40 percent of our lakes 
and rivers are still not clean enough for our people to swim in them--
and three, as the Vice President said, we received a substantial 
increase to meet our responsibilities in the area of global climate 
change. So that's very important.
    But let me say that in many ways I am most proud of the decision 
that this budget reflects not to squander the surplus until we meet our 
responsibilities to reform Social Security for the 21st century.
    Yes, there were some disappointments. I wished that we had passed 
the school rehabilitation and construction proposal. We have to have 
school facilities so that we can have those smaller classes. And yes, I 
wish we'd passed the Patients Bills of Rights and campaign finance 
reform and the tobacco reform legislation and the minimum wage. But we 
can now go out and have a great national debate about that. The 
important thing that we have to recognize is that these hard-fought 
battles and major accomplishments represent, finally, in 8 days what we 
did not have for 8 months.
    We were able to put the progress of the country ahead of 
partisanship. We were able to put people ahead of politics. And today 
every American can take a great deal of pride in knowing that we are 
going to save Social Security, that we are going to have 100,000 
teachers, that we are going to continue to move forward on the 
environment, and that now we are free here in this administration

[[Page 2060]]

to keep our economy going by meeting our responsibilities to deal with 
the global economic challenges.
    This is a very, very good day for America. And I thank all the 
people behind me for everything they did to bring it about.
    Thank you.

Legislative Agenda for Education

    Q. Mr. President, you rattled off a list of many of your priorities 
which this Congress did not give you, priorities from your State of the 
Union Address. Why did you--and all of you, perhaps--specifically decide 
to hold the line on the education issue, on the idea of more funding for 
education, et cetera? Did you think that would have the most resonance 
with the voters?

    The President. Well, no, it's what we believed in. We got the entire 
education program except for three things. First of all, the huge 
funding increases for education. But they were properly targeted. This 
100,000 teachers--this is truly historic. The United States--this is the 
educational equivalent of what we did when we put 100,000 police on the 
street. And I will remind you that we now have the lowest crime rate in 
25 years. We have never done that before. And we had the same partisan 
argument then. We were told that it wouldn't work, that it was 
interference in local government, even though all the police chiefs of 
the country were screaming, ``Give it to us.'' Now we were told the same 
thing here.
    This is an historic commitment by the United States to put 100,000 
teachers out there for smaller classes in the early grades. That, plus 
the historic commitment we made to after-school and summer school 
programs, plus the continued funding to hook up all the classrooms to 
the Internet by the year 2000--these things are truly historic.
    Now, I wish we had been able to persuade the Republican majority to 
give us the school construction and rehabilitation proposal because we 
need modern facilities, and that proposal is a paid-for-tax cut in the 
balanced budget that would enable us to build or rehabilitate 5,000 
schools. I think that's important. I still think we ought to be a nation 
which says we should have high standards, and I wish we had had an 
explicit proposal on that. And I believe in the empowerment educational 
opportunity zones to reward schools that end social promotion and fund 
more after-school and summer school programs.
    Now, those are three things that I would like to have. But we can 
debate those and work for those in the election. We have differences of 
opinions, and they have more Members than we do. They're against the 
Patients' Bill of Rights, and we're for it. They were against 
reforming--passing the tobacco reform legislation and against the 
campaign finance reform. But when you compare where we were for 8 months 
with where we are today, and how good this is for America, that the 
things that I talked about in the State of the Union in education, in 
the environment, in the international economy, and saving Social 
Security, these are huge victories for the American people.
    We did the best we could, and I think the best we did by staying 
together was very good, indeed. And I think the American people will 
believe so, too.
    Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 3:30 p.m. in the South Lawn at the White 
House.